Nottingham Forest have not resolved their dispute with Gary Neville before the new Premier League season and want assurances from the Sky Sports pundit before welcoming him back to the City Ground.<\/p>\n
The former Manchester United captain was banned by Forest<\/a> from the final game of last season after an intervention from their owner, Evangelos Marinakis, who had taken exception to Neville\u2019s criticisms of his conduct.<\/p>\n Although Neville is not formally banned, the Guardian has been told Sky should not expect Neville to be accommodated as things stand. Forest want to resolve the issue but will demand assurances Neville will be more careful in his language when discussing Marinakis before confirming he can attend.<\/p>\n Neville\u2019s claim in April 2024 that the club were behaving like \u201ca mafia gang\u201d particularly angered Marinakis and led to the owner threatening legal action against Sky. In a statement three months later, the broadcaster said: \u201cSky Sports have discussed with Gary the language used and its potential to cause offence.\u201d Sky also apologised \u201cfor any offence caused\u201d.<\/p>\n Neville has not been to Forest since he made those comments. He had been due to be part of Sky\u2019s team there on the final day of last season for the visit of Chelsea but the broadcaster was forced to change its plans at the last minute, after Neville was denied media accreditation<\/a>. It used its studios to present coverage of a game that decided the European fate of both clubs.<\/p>\n Sky described Forest\u2019s ban as \u201can unprecedented and unwelcome step\u201d. Neville wrote on social media at the time: \u201cI\u2019ve dished out my fair share of criticism and praise in the last 14 years of doing this job and have never come close to this unprecedented action. Personally, I think it\u2019s disappointing that a great club like Nottingham Forest have been reduced to making such a decision. Whilst they have every right to choose who they let into their own stadium, it\u2019s symptomatic of things that have happened over the last 12 months with the club.\u201d<\/p>\n Two weeks earlier Neville had criticised Marinakis for walking on to the pitch and remonstrating with Forest\u2019s manager, Nuno Esp\u00edrito Santo, after a 2-2 draw with Leicester. Marinakis said he was frustrated that the injured forward Taiwo Awoniyi had been allowed to play on after colliding with a post. The striker had abdominal surgery<\/a> the next day.<\/p>\n Evangelos Marinakis (left) makes his thoughts known to Nottingham Forest\u2019s manager, Nuno Esp\u00edrito Santo, after May\u2019s game against Leicester. Photograph: Justin Tallis\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Neville described Marinakis\u2019s conduct as \u201cscandalous\u201d and said Nuno should \u201cnegotiate his exit\u201d over the way he appeared to have been spoken to by the owner.<\/p>\n Neville said the club had acted like a \u201cmafia gang\u201d in issuing a statement that criticised the video assistant referee<\/a> Stuart Attwell after a 2-0 defeat at Everton. Forest were fined \u00a3750,000<\/a> by the Football Association for \u201can attack on the integrity of a match official on an unparalleled scale\u201d but, after threatening legal action, secured the apology from Sky.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n Sign up to Football Daily<\/p>\n Kick off your evenings with the Guardian’s take on the world of football<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Forest did not breach any regulations by denying access to Neville but the league was unimpressed at the treatment of its main domestic broadcast partner. Sky will broadcast live coverage of Forest\u2019s opening game against Brentford at the City Ground on Sunday, but Neville will be at Old Trafford for Manchester United v Arsenal.<\/p>\n Sky is understood to have assumed Neville\u2019s ban was a one-off and that the matter was closed, but further talks will be required to resolve the standoff.<\/p>\n Forest and Sky Sports declined to comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nottingham Forest have not resolved their dispute with Gary Neville before the new Premier League season and want…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,561,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-68277","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-soccer","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-soccer","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}